"I get the chills thinking about it"

Gary D'Amato talks to Jerry Kelly about the killer concept he and Steve Stricker are floating to save the Milwaukee stop. He just won't actually reveal what it is, but he's excited and says Tim Finchem "loved it." And it wasn't his idea?

"Missed short putt, got a buried lie in bunker face coming in. not bad, almost great."

Guess that's the extent of dad's day one account (caddying is exhausting!).

Mike Van Sickle is right on the bubble after opening -1 at the Deere, should make for some interesting online tracking Friday. Besides being a great story, I'll do anything to not ponder a possible Lee Janzen win.

“You’ve got Tiger and Anthony Kim in the last group. Does it really matter who’s not here?”

Doug Ferguson tries to figure out why more top players aren't coming to the swampy, stagnant, dreary Congressional two weeks before the Open Championship and where the host is Tiger Woods.

Van Sickle To Face Scribes

SI's Gary Van Sickle is caddying for son Mike's PGA Tour debut this week, writing about it and Tweeting about it. First Tweet reports that Mike has been called into the press room. Oh to be a fly on the wall when dad tries to coach son answering questions.

"He told me to stay positive, something like that"

I can't post much because I'm looking into two health stories related to the 2009 AT&T National final round. One involves reports of several suicide attempts after the second mesmerizingly depressing SPCA ad ran during the finale. The other involves the poor lad turning his back and bending over to avoid Anthony Kim's 18th hole drive, only to be plunked on the tush.

Meanwhile, Thomas Bonk, writing about Tiger Woods' win over rival-in-the-making Kim:

Kim dropped to third behind Mahan with a one-over 71. The way things were going, his most interesting shot of the day might have been his tee shot at the 18th, where the ball went so far off-line, it popped a fan on the derriere.

Woods and Kim shook hands before they got started and that's about as close as they got the rest of the day, unless you count the times they stood in the tee box together. Until they chatted while walking down the 18th fairway, they hadn't exchanged a word.

"He told me to stay positive, something like that," Kim said.

See how took those words to heart!

Kim chalked the whole thing up as a learning experience, sort of on-the-job training.

"I learned that if you have a birdie putt, you'd better make it, especially on the last day," Kim said. "Tiger obviously wins for a reason."

See, he doesn't miss a beat.

Two mind-boggling Tiger stats, courtesy of the PGA Tour's Mark Williams:

• Woods has now won 46 of 49 tournaments (94%) when leading/co-leading after 54-holes. The three he didn't win -- 1996 Quad City Open/T5, 2000/2004 THE TOUR Championship/2ndboth times.

• Woods has won 32 of 38 tournaments after holding the 36-hole lead/co-lead -- that's 84 percent.

Showdown With Woods Offers Kim Chance To Face His Hero And Ask How Many Majors He's Won

Doug Ferguson reports on Sunday's potentially exciting showdown between Anthony Kim and Tiger Woods, with background on Kim growing up idolizing Woods. But unlike Woods who committed every Jack Nicklaus record to memory, Anthony is still fuzzy on Tiger's history.

Actually, wouldn't it be fun if old geezer Michael Allen slipped in and won the thing?

Loopers Earning Their AT&T Pay...

...trying to remember to keep Saturday's American flagstick flags from touching the ground, as Rex Hoggard notes.

“We can see everything, frame by frame.”

Rex Hoggard says that D.A. Points attributes his improved play to...his iPhone 3GS.

“It’s amazing,” said Points, who has his caddie video him with the new device and then e-mail it to his swing coach Brian Mogg in central Florida. “We can see everything, frame by frame.”